


Peace and Quiet

by flourry



Category: Black Panther (2018), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Asshole Bucky Barnes, Definitely some sexual tension, Eventual Smut, F/M, OC definitely has some issues but we'll figure it out, Psychological Trauma, but a lovable asshole
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-01-04
Updated: 2019-01-08
Packaged: 2019-10-03 21:59:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 5
Words: 7,516
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17292200
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/flourry/pseuds/flourry
Summary: Akeja left her royal life behind to settle for a peaceful existence in the Wakandan countryside. Now she's stuck with a sassy one-armed ex-assassin who keeps finding ways to make her life harder than it is. She should've stayed home.





	1. one ;

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Akeja's brother shows up at her house unannounced. She is not amused.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> so happy to finally post the story that's been running thru my head! hope you enjoy!

_**Wakanda; before the end** _

* * *

 

Akeja had become used to the silence of the Wakandan countryside. While the bustling city was constantly alive with the buzzing and humming of machines and people, the outskirts were quiet and peaceful. It was just her, her goats and her ragged excuse for a house. Really, it was a shack on a small patch of land, but it was hers.

Naturally, Akeja thought that surrendering her past life to nature would be a surefire way of being left alone. However, her meddling family apparently didn't understand nor care for boundaries, so the hazel-eyed woman wasn't surprised to see the newly crowned King of Wakanda standing on her porch.

"Sister," T-Challa began, but Akeja had already spun around and began walking into her kitchen. She didn't bother telling him to follow, knowing he would chase after her to finish whatever bullshit proposition he'd come up with to lure her back to the palace.

It had been months since Akeja had last step foot in her ancestral home. After her father's untimely death, it had become difficult to stride through the halls knowing that he'd never walk beside her again, but it was Killmonger's attempted takeover that had been the final straw. Her own flesh and blood had pressed a blade to her throat and told her to obey or face whatever god waited for her. Part of her had known that if her father hadn't lied, if he had taken that boy home with him, she never would've had to take the lives of the men who had joined Erik's side. Sometimes she could still taste copper in her mouth - could still hear the screams of young boys as she gutted them in the name of Wakanda.

Now, she wished to be left alone.

Akeja turned off the stove and lifted the finished pot of steaming stew onto the awaiting trivet. Steeling herself, she turned around to face her brother. He was leaning against her small dining table, arms crossed sternly. If she squinted she could almost see a reflection of their father in him. The thought made her stomach churn.

"Talk," she commanded, waving a hand at him expectantly.

"I need a favor," T'Challa said, watching his sister carefully for her reaction. Akeja's eyes had narrowed almost imperceptibly but she had not made a move to say anything. The King took that as a good sign. "We have taken in a foreigner - one who is in great need of our help."

At that, Akeja couldn't help but scoff. "Do you not remember the last time that you allowed a foreigner into our lands? He took your throne and then started a civil war. Are you sure you want to take chances?"

T'Challa's jaw clenched at her tone. "It is not the same. I owe him. He is the man who I had thought murdered our father. I... made grave mistakes in my grief."

 _Yes, yes you did,_ Akeja couldn't help but seethe internally. Their father had been blown to pieces on live television and the brother that she had needed to stand by her side had disappeared to stupidly enact vengeance. She was left to pick up the pieces by herself; to support a devastated teenage sister and a mother who had become distant in her grief. Then, she'd had to swallow her anger and welcome him back into their lives when it was revealed that the man he'd left them to kill was not the true culprit, but rather a pawn in another man's chess game. Grave mistakes, indeed.

However, Akeja did not give a voice to her thoughts. Goading her brother into an argument was tempting but she knew that would only result in him storming out in a rage and then coming back at a later time to finish asking for whatever favor he desired. She would prefer that they got this visit finished in one go.

"How is Wakanda now that we have finally gone public?" she asked, turning and reaching into a cupboard above for two bowls.

As she began ladling stew into the porcelain, her brother replied. "It has been interesting, but freeing. There is no more need to pretend to be something that we are not."

"Yes," Akeja murmured. "I would think so."

"Shuri has been asking about you constantly. She misses you. Mother, too."

Akeja's heart turned to lead in her chest. Tears stung her eyes, but she had already swallowed them down before she swung round to pass her brother a bowl. He took it with a gracious nod, eyes darting around her face in a manner that she knew meant he was analyzing her reaction. T'Challa had a talent of being able to read her better than anyone she'd ever met before. He must have seen the wet sheen in her eyes but said nothing of it.

"I miss them, too," she confessed quietly, clearing her throat. "But my place is not beside them anymore. At least not yet. I need... I need time."

"Of course," T'Challa said, but Akeja knew that he did not understand and most likely never would.

The two siblings settled into an almost comfortable silence as they began to eat. After a few minutes, T'Challa placed his bowl carefully on the dining table beside him.

"I want you to take him into your home."

" _What?_ " Akeja's voice had risen to a pitch she didn't know she could hit.

T'Challa eyed her warily. "That is the favor. He has had a difficult life. I want him to know peace, away from the busy nature of the city. I would like you to open your home to him - just for a short while."

" _Short while?_ "

"Yes, Akeja. Are you not listening?"

She couldn't believe it. She had moved away from her family to find the peace and quiet that her psyche demanded, and now she was being asked to hand that over a man she didn't know? A man who had almost been convicted of her father's murder? Her brother had to be playing a very stupid prank on her.

"I refuse to!" she spat, "My house is not a hotel for strange white men. House him somewhere else."

T'Challa had been expecting her reaction. His shoulders were squared and his face was schooled into a neutral, calm expression. He was facing her the same way he had faced the UN after the death of their father. Recognizing that same steely determination in his eyes only made the rage in her blood hotter.

"Do not give me that look! I said no, T'Challa! Leave now that you have your answer!"

"Do not make me pull rank on you, sister," T'Challa warned. "The King of Wakanda is asking you to house a friend. It would be unwise to refuse."

In a past life, Akeja would've started throwing stew at his face. She was tempted to. But they had both grown. Hearing the brother who had wiped tears from her cheeks and kissed bloody knees demand that she do as he asked lest she face the wrath of the crown that had raised her was almost heartbreaking. She knew that he would continue bothering her until she accepted; she could see it in his face.

So, she swallowed her pride - even if it cost her. "I will do this, brother. But if he does anything that I don't like, I will slit his throat in his sleep. Are we clear?"

T'Challa's eyes softened. "We are clear."

"Now, get out."


	2. two ;

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky learns that he's going to be a farmer. He meets Akeja. She is not amused.

Bucky had almost been surprised when he'd found himself going through the familiar notion of waking up from cyrofreeze. He had accepted long ago that the next time his body touched a cryofreeze chamber after his escape from Hydra, it would be for forever. There was a part of him that didn't want to accept the idea of retribution - of finally being freed from a mind constantly warring with itself. To not be the Winter Soldier or James Barnes, but rather someone in the middle. He had always assumed that no one would ever be able to heal him, and he deserved that fate.

Though, he couldn't hide the relief he felt as his eyes squinted against the glaring lights above him. If Shuri was bringing him out of the dark, that meant she had  _succeeded_. No more nightmares, no more living in trepidation of someone whispering those dreaded words and sending him spiraling back into the hold of the Winter Soldier. Of Hydra. He was free. Not of the guilt, which still threatened to consume him on his weaker days (despite Steve's annoyingly constant assurance that it  _wasn't his fault_ ), but of the fear.

"Welcome back, white boy."

Bucky had never thought he would be ecstatic to see the face of a teenager three inches away from his. Shuri was grinning widely, her eyes shining with mirth.

"White boy?" his vocal cords strained with the effort to speak, still healing from the numbing effects of the cryo. "I thought we'd agreed on 'white man'. Do these look like 'boy' muscles to you?"

"Shut up," Shuri leaned back to snap some latex gloves on her hands. "You're lucky you even have muscles at your old age."

"I'm not that old," he grinned, unable to help himself. The teenage princess reminded him of someone he'd known in the past - a blonde, he recalled, although her face was a blur. She too had liked to match his wit with her own.

"Look into the light," Shuri told him, shining a small torch directly at his pupil. He did as was commanded, sitting perfectly still as she waved the beam between both eyes and hummed.

"Shouldn't a doctor be doing this?" he teased.

Shuri scoffed. "I am ten times smarter than any doctor who would examine you. Now give me your arm. I need to check your blood pressure."

Bucky let Shuri conduct whatever test she desired. The whole process was quick and efficient, as were most things Shuri did.

"You are in perfect health!" Shuri announced, peeling her gloves off and launching them at a bin placed in the corner of the lab. She missed, much to Bucky's amusement, but did not move to pick them up from the floor. "I'll get that later."

"So am I..." Bucky struggled to find the word. "Stable?"

The teenager clapped her hands together. She had been waiting for him to ask that. "Yep! It was no easy feat, I'll tell you that, but I have healed you, white boy. Your mind is no longer broken. You are in full control of yourself."

Just as Bucky was about to ask _what_   _now_?, the doors to the laboratory slid open to reveal Wakanda's very own King. His face was pinched with annoyance.

"I spoke to Akeja," he announced. "She agreed to do what I asked."

 _Akeja? Who's Akeja?_  Bucky wracked his mind for any mentioning of that name. While his memory was not as solid as it had once been, he was sure that he had never heard or met 'Akeja' before. The way Shuri's normally bright face fell at the mentioning of it made him curious.

"Lucky you, white boy," Shuri said wryly. "Tell my sister I said 'hi'."

_Sister_ _?_

* * *

T'Challa had explained that he had found a place for Bucky to recover. At first, Bucky was unwilling to be housed with a stranger, even if they were apparently a royal sibling, but it was Shuri who had masterfully talked him into it.  _It'll be some peace and quiet for you, old man. You can become a farmer_. He couldn't lie, the idea of doing farmer shit like planting crops hadn't appealed to him at first, but he decided that he'd try it out. It wasn't like he had much else to do.

Bucky had not expected to have been dropped off at what he had expected was going to be a grand farmhouse, but was really a rundown shack. It was falling apart, the porch splintered and the wooden shingles hanging by a hope and a prayer. The two wooden pillars supporting the front of the shack weren't quite the same size, giving it the appearance that it was falling to the side. He was surprised the whole thing hadn't collapsed in on itself, and even more so to find out that someone had been living in the building the whole time. It was a far cry from the futuristic Wakandan architecture he had been exposed to.

While the 'house' was sore to look at, the land encasing it was the opposite. It was situated in a clearing, surrounded by lush green trees that seemed to stretch on into the sky forever. He had forgotten how beautiful Wakanda was. He continued his assessment of the property, baring his teeth at a pair of goats that were staring at him from across the yard, as T'Challa rapped his knuckles on the faded door.

"I was hoping you had forgotten about me."

Bucky's eyes shot forward. The door was opened, and standing at the entrance to her home was the woman that he rightfully guessed was Akeja, sister to Shuri and T'Challa. She was short in comparison to her siblings, barely reaching Bucky's shoulder. Her dark hair hung down past her waist in intricate braids. Woven within them were red, orange and yellow threads, giving her the illusion that her hair was on fire. Her eyes, a striking hazel green, were bearing into his with a glare so fierce that he would've flinched if he was a weaker man.

Damn, she was gorgeous.

"I would never," T'Challa's voice crooned from beside him, bringing Bucky back into reality. He wondered how long he'd been standing there like a creep, staring her down.

"Whatever," Akeja rolled her eyes. "Come in but don't touch anything. I'm painting."

Her voice was silky, but deeper than he'd heard before on a woman. Like dark chocolate. When she turned around to enter her house, he found himself watching her hips swing from side to side as she walked. If T'Challa noticed where his eyes had wandered to, he didn't mention it.

Her home was an even bigger mess inside than it was on the outside. The living room consisted of shabby, mismatching furniture. There was a yellow couch, a blue coffee table, a television stand consisting of two crates that had been painted a blinding green. In fact, everything was a different color - from the bookshelves to the beads that hung down separating the living room from the other parts of the house. It almost made his eyes burn having to look at it.

In the middle of the living room, however, was a large easel and a chair bearing an assortment of paint palettes and cups of murky water. Brushes, some clean and some dirty, littered the floor beside it. He stepped closer, rounding to couch to observe what she had been painting. A battle field, he realized, streaked with striking red blood and deep, dark brown dirt. She had not began to add color to the corpses strewn through-out the canvas, but her soft penciled lines detailed their wide, open eyes. A shiver ran down his spine. He had seen that unseeing gaze of death many times in his life, on many different faces.

"Why do you only paint morbid scenes, sister?" T'Challa sighed, his voice tinged with disappointment. "I miss when you would paint portraits of mother or me."

"Yes, but times are different now." Her voice came from behind him, closer than he thought she would be. When Bucky faced her, she was looking right at him, her eyes still alight with anger.

T'Challa rested a hand upon Bucky's shoulder; the one missing the arm. Once upon a time, he would've felt lost without the hulking metal weapon that had taken so many souls, but now he felt that it was a weight that had been lifted from him. He was no longer the monster that he used to be, but something new, clay to be shaped as he desired.

"This is Bucky," T'Challa presented. "Bucky, that is Akeja, Princess of Wakanda and pain in my ass."

"Nice to meet you," Bucky flashed her a smile that he hoped was dazzling. Her responding scowl made him chuckle.

"T'Challa," Akeja hissed through gritted teeth. "Can I talk to you in the kitchen?"

Bucky rocked back and forth on his heels as the siblings stepped beyond one of the beaded doorways. His enhanced hearing allowed him to hear everything they were whispering about, so there was really no point for them to flee into another room. Though he guessed only T'Challa knew that.

_"How long is he going to stay here?"_

_"I told you, not very long. Long enough for him to heal. You should know what it is like to need peace away from the world. Offer it to him."_

_"If he does anything I don't like-"_

_"I know, I know. But hurting a one-armed man? That is beneath you."_

_"Nothing is beneath me. Why isn't Shuri with you?"_

_"You know why. She'll only see you when you return to the palace. You hurt her by leaving, Akeja."_

_"Get out."_

T'Challa walked back into the living room a moment later. Bucky was staring intently at a piece of dust on the coffee table.

"I know you heard what was said." T'Challa sighed, pinching the top of his nose with two fingers. The King had never looked so rundown before, not even when he'd been chasing Bucky around Europe to murder him.  _Ah, memories shared among friends_. "Watch over her, Barnes. She is weaker than she looks."

Bucky's brow furrowed, but the monarch had already shut the front door behind him before he could even think to ask what he'd meant.

The rustling of the doorway beads caught his attention. Akeja stared at him for an agonizingly awkward minute, and then gestured at him with her hand. It took him a minute to register that she was doing so to his missing arm.

"So where is it?" she asked. "Last time I saw, you had a metal one."

Bucky shrugged. "I'm better off without it."

She seemed accepting of his answer. "You hungry?"

Bucky's stomach growled as if on cue. " _God,_ yes."

"Come eat then. I have made a fish soup."

"What if I don't like fish?"

Akeja's lips pursed, her eyes flashing with annoyance. "Then you can starve."

Bucky had never grinned so hard in  _years_. As he followed her into her kitchen, he realized that his time as a farmer was going to be even more fun than he'd originally thought.


	3. three ;

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Akeja is still making threats. Bucky is still being annoying.

Bucky had been in her home for less than thirty minutes and had already managed to make her feel like she should have kicked her brother in the chest for even daring to ask her if he could stay.

At first, he had turned up his nose distastefully at the pot of food slowly simmering on the stove and proclaimed that perhaps he wasn't as hungry as he thought. When he saw her hand slowly reaching towards the bright yellow knife block on the counter, he had quickly asked her if she had enough for him to have a second helping. She had fumed so much during her meal that it felt like her serving turned immediately to acid in her insides.

After washing up, she chose to show him where he'd be sleeping. She didn't have a spare room - really, her own bedroom was only big enough for her bed and two chest of drawers - but she had a pull-out couch. His face when she demonstrated how to work the couch made a zap of satisfaction shoot through her. If she had to suffer his presence for Bast knows how long, he would have to endure nights on the most uncomfortable type of mattress known to man.

"I'm sleeping... on that?" he eyed the couch warily.

"Yep!" she chirped, just a little too happily. "If you don't like it, you're welcome to go back to the palace."

"No, no," he smiled, his eyes lit up with amusement. "I've slept on worse. Besides, I'm sure there's room on your bed if I get  _too_  uncomfortable."

Akeja fixed him with a deadpan look. "If you  _ever_  try sneaking into my bed, I will sever your manhood from your body."

"Sure, doll," he snickered. "I'll take your word for it."

It occurred to her then, as she glared him down, that he hadn't brought any bags of clothing or belongings with him.

"Where are your clothes?" she asked.

Bucky raised an eyebrow and motioned to his body with a flourish that managed to be strangely sarcastic. The unspoken  _right here_  hung in the air between them, irritating Akeja even further.

"I don't mean the clothes you're wearing right now. I mean the ones you'll be wearing during your stay here." Akeja struggled to get the words out in a manner that didn't betray how frustrated she was. Though she could see by Bucky's self-satisfied grin that she was not succeeding.  _Asshole_.

"Don't have any," he said. "T'Challa said you'd have everything I needed and I only have these clothes anyway."

Akeja swept her eyes down his form. He was wearing a white shirt, dark-wash jeans that had seen better days and a pair of intimidating black boots. He couldn't have been so obviously not from Wakanda if he'd tattooed 'foreigner' on his forehead. Annoyingly, she knew exactly why T'Challa had told him that she'd have what he needed.

"I might have clothing that fits you," she admitted through gritted teeth. "They won't be what you're used to but they'll fit the purpose."

Bucky smirked. "Bring on the Wakandan farmer outfits."

* * *

Akeja wasn't surprised to find out that the bags upon bags of fabric she had stashed under her bed fit Bucky perfectly. He was tall, muscled and broad-shouldered; much like the man who'd once owned them had been. Seeing him stepping out of her bedroom in the dark robes that she'd stitched together herself made something inside her tighten. The pale, bearded face that stared back at her was not the one that she wished to see at that moment.

"Hey!" Bucky called, drawing her attention. "Do I look like Jesus? I feel like I look like a one-armed Jesus. The robes and the beard? C'mon, tell me you see it."

Akeja rolled her eyes. "You're not wearing it right."

Bucky looked down, affronted. "What do you mean? There's not many ways you can wear a man-dress, Akeja."

 _It's not a dress_ , she felt like muttering. Instead, she stepped forward until she was close enough to touch him. The fabric draped around his shoulders was lopsided, almost like it had been haphazardly thrown on. This was most likely because he only had use of one arm. Slowly, she reached up and fixed the cloth so that it was placed properly instead of all of it hanging to one side. She didn't miss the way his breath stilled when her fingertips accidentally brushed against his collarbone. His skin felt warm, even through the layers of fabric. When she looked up into his eyes (they were so blue, like the Wakandan lakes in the sunlight), they were glazed over. The air between them suddenly felt too thick for her to breathe.

Irked, Akeja moved back and clasped her hands together. It was better that she shoved whatever had just transpired between them under the  _let's pretend that never happened_  carpet. What was wrong with her? She quickly reminded herself that this was a man that was intruding on her territory and ruining the peace she had worked hard for and deserved. Muddled confusion turned back to annoyance.

"You're welcome to explore the land as you wish." The dryness in her voice made Bucky's brow furrow. She ignored the look. "Just don't stay out too long after dark. We have panthers."

* * *

Bucky was still standing in the middle of Akeja's living room, mouth dry, minutes after she'd pushed past him to retreat into her bedroom. His chest felt like it was on fire where she'd touched him, even if the whole thing had only lasted a fleeting moment. He burned with the urge to grab the woman who he barely knew and bend her over any piece of ugly furniture that littered her house. Remembering that she'd probably honor her promise to dismember him and that her older brother would be less than happy to find out he'd laid hands on her was the only thing rooting him down where he stood.

She'd felt it too, surely. He'd seen it in her eyes; in the way her mouth had opened as if she couldn't fill her lungs with air. For a second, there had been mutual desire.

God, when was the last time he'd touched a woman? He didn't even want to properly think about it.

Instead of marching into her room and throwing her over the shoulder like he wanted to, Bucky decided he would take up her offer to 'explore the land'.

Stepping outside into the Wakandan heat was like walking into a solid wall of humidity. It felt warmer than it had been when he'd arrived in the morning, the sun high in the sky. He was beginning to feel severely overdressed in the robes she'd given him, but he assumed he'd get used to the heat pretty quickly. His previous missions in diverse climates, some even hotter than Wakanda, had made sure that his body was able to adapt fast. He had to be able to make the shot, to slit a throat, to disarm a soldier in seconds, no matter what the weather was like. It was either that or face punishment, and that was never fun.

A slight movement in his peripheral vision caught his attention. His fingers twitched for the familiar butt of a gun that would've once been strapped to a thigh holster.

It was the pair of goats. They were ambling towards him, their eyes strangely curious. He stretched out his arm and felt as the horned male walked into it, butting his palm with their head. It didn't seem to fear him at all. The smaller female hung behind, observing their silent interaction. Bucky gave her a few minutes to introduce herself, but when it became apparent that she wasn't going to approach he decided to move on.

There wasn't much to see around Akeja's home. She had a small vegetable garden that he noticed had only been recently cultivated and towards the left of the shack lay the beginnings of a rose bush. The rosebuds were blue - he'd never seen that species before. It seemed everything about Wakanda was different from the rest of the world - from the fauna to the women. 

Bucky spared a glance at the forest surrounding him but decided that it was too late in the afternoon to step foot within. Besides, he doubted that the robes he was wearing would serve him any good if he had decided to. The fabric rustled too much when he moved. He wanted to be silent during his surveillance. There was no doubt that the trees could very easily hide someone looking to cause trouble, and he didn't want to spook them. 

 _That's settled, then_. Satisfied with his decision, Bucky made to go back into the house. Just as he was about to step onto the porch, a fluttering of wings above him drew his eye. It was a magnificent bird, its feathers a gorgeous aquamarine. As soon as the bird made to land on the roof of the shack, the shingle beneath it came loose and slid down at a speed that not even Bucky managed to evade. It ricocheted off the top of his head with a  _thunk_ , before landing in the grass in front of him. 

"Shit!" the ex-assassin cursed, palming his sore skull. 

Looks like he had his farmer work cut out for him.


	4. four ;

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky almost bares it all. Akeja is (rightfully) outraged.

_Akeja couldn't breathe. She scratched desperately at the hand wrapped around her throat, scrambling for just a moment of air. His face was all she could see; he was close enough that his breath was warm on her cheeks. His eyes were dead, empty and soulless. Looking into them made her whole body feel like she was emerged in ice-water._

_Her ears had started ringing from the lack of oxygen but she could still hear her mother's shrieks._

_"Cousin," Erik crooned. "Say it to me one more time."_

_She couldn't breathe! Her eyesight began to blur with tears. His face lost definition and became hazy. She couldn't feel her fingers, her arms... her legs..._

_Abruptly, his hand left her. The breath that she sucked in felt like a punch to the chest. Her legs gave out and she found herself crouched on the floor, scrambling for purchase against the cold marble. Her lungs heaved in an effort to take in as much oxygen as possible._

_"Go on," he goaded. "Say it one more fucking time. I wanna hear it."_

_Despite her agony, Akeja still felt defiance surge through her veins. The sensation was akin to adrenaline, and it gave her the strength that she needed._

_"You will never be the King of Wakanda, you piece of American trash."_

_Her voice was quiet, strained from the pain, but Erik had heard every word. So had her mother._

_"No!" the Queen wailed. "Please, I cannot lose my children!"_

_Erik's eyes darkened. He bared his teeth in a gruesome, bloodthirsty smile. "Don't worry, aunty. I'm not entirely cruel. I'll leave you with the brat."_

Akeja woke with a start. She pushed herself into an upright position and buried her face in her knees, taking deep, even breaths. She was not about to lose her shit over a nightmare about a dead man. When her heart rate finally calmed, she leaned back into her headboard.

She didn't remember falling asleep. She knew that she had gone into her bedroom to get away from Bucky and flopped down onto her bed in a way that would've put any one of her teenage sister's strops to shame. Somewhere in between cursing Bucky's name and thinking up ways to kill him in his sleep, she must have dozed off.

A quick glance at her bedroom window told her that she had been napping for a good couple of hours. The sun was almost setting, casting a glorious mirage of purples, oranges and reds across the land. Truly, there was nothing that compared to a Wakandan sunset. 

The sight made her smile wistfully, but her face quickly fell into a frown when she realized that she could hear running water. There was only one bathroom in the shack, and it was connected to her bedroom. The only way that someone could enter it was to walk directly through her room. She had an annoying feeling that she knew  _exactly_ who had decided to do as they damn well pleased and invade her privacy to go take a damn shower. As if he couldn't wait until she'd woken up.

Akeja tensed her jaw and closed her eyes, attempting the find the sliver of patience within her. She knew that if he was going to stay with her for whoever knows how long, that she might as well make an effort to get along with him. She didn't want to feel as if she was at war within her home - she'd had enough of war - but he was making it  _so damn hard_. She had never wanted to knock sheer sense into someone much in her life. Though something inside her knew that Barnes would continue making an effort to irritate her whether or not she was trying to be nice. 

So she decided that for the moment, she was going to be cruel.

Just as she was about to rise and cut off the hot water at the boiler, the bathroom door swung open. In her ire, she had not heard the shower turn off. She suddenly deeply wished that she was still having that nightmare. Feeling Erik Killmonger's hands drain the life out of her body would've been better than seeing James Buchanan Barnes, infamous ex-assassin, step into her bedroom wearing nothing but a towel.

A towel that she recognized.  _Her_ towel. 

Her hands drew her sheets into tight fists. " _What_ are you doing?"

Bucky scoffed, rubbing at his wet hair with yet another towel that was hers. "Uh, drying myself. Isn't that obvious?"

The mischievous twinkle in his eyes reminded her all too quickly of their moment in the living room. Her cheeks burned but her expression remained fierce. She was not going to let him make her feel uncomfortable in her own damn bedroom. 

"Your water pressure is amazing," he commented nonchalantly, walking over to the edge of her bed. She noticed that not only had he brazenly invaded her space, he had also rooted around through her bags of clothing to find an outfit to wear after his shower. And then he'd apparently laid it out on  _her_ bed. 

Akeja was overcome with the childish urge to kick her feet up and send the fabric fluttering to the floor.

"Well," he said, raising an eyebrow. "Are you gonna leave or not? I don't usually get dressed in front of company, at least not anymore, but I will happily let you watch if you wanna." 

The insinuation behind his words made her gasp - at first with embarrassment, and then with anger.

"I'm not going to leave my bedroom just because you want me to!" she exclaimed, outraged. "Get dressed in the bathroom!"

"Fine," he shrugged in response. "Watch then."

He moved to drop the towel wrapped loosely around his hips. The motion revealed a sliver of wet, tanned abdomen that made Akeja come to terms with the sudden fact that Bucky was  _very much_ naked. 

Akeja fled her room like a bat out of hell, pretending that the heat she felt gather in her core was raw anger. She would not accept that a part of her, no matter how small or how insignificant, found Bucky and his very defined, very taut muscles attractive.

For once, she was more annoyed with herself than she was with him.

* * *

Bucky couldn't help but chuckle as he watched her dart out. She was just too fun to mess with. He knew that eventually she would find a way to pay him back for the trouble he was causing her - he didn't think for a second that a woman like Akeja would let him have the one up on her for very long - but he couldn't resist antagonizing her. Especially when he'd seen that familiar flash of desire in those gorgeous hazel eyes of hers. Whether she liked it or not, a part of Akeja was very much drawn to him; even if it was just sexually.

Not that that bothered Bucky. He'd wanted to peel her clothes off her skin since the moment she'd opened her front door to him. 

He dressed as quickly as he could in his one-armed state and deposited the wet towels in the laundry hamper beside the bathroom door. Then he strode out into the living room.

Akeja had seated herself in front of her easel. She was holding a paintbrush daintily between two fingers, dipping it into a pot of crimson paint. Then, with experienced precision, she swept the tip of the brush across the canvas. It was the same painting that he'd seen when he'd first arrived - the one with the corpses that had yet to be filled in. He crossed the living room to stand behind her, observing with attentive eyes as she began to add shading to a deep wound cutting through the torso of one of the figures.

"Who..." he trailed off, uncertain how to ask what the hell she was painting. "What... what is this?"

"War," she replied, as if that was sufficient.

"Yes," he said quietly. That was obvious, considering the sheer amount of carnage she had depicted. "Here?"

Her entire body stiffened at his question. She brought the paint brush down and dipped it a cup of clean water, turning the clear liquid a murky, familiar red. He didn't want to think about whatever memories the sight was stirring up, instead focusing on the petite woman sitting in front of him.

"Yes, here," she answered, swirling the tip of the now clean paintbrush into a deep brown. 

She did not clarify any further and he chose not to ask any more questions. It was obvious from her curt answers that he wasn't going to get anywhere with the topic, and he didn't want to pry into what was seemingly a sore spot for her. He understood what it was like to suffer because of war, better than anyone, and even more what it was like to have secrets.

 

 

 

 

 

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I keep updating so fast cuz im in love with this, it flows out so easily lol especially writing bucky
> 
> i hope you guys are enjoying this!  
> thanks for reading !


	5. five;

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Bucky makes a little bit of progress. Little bit.

Early next morning, Bucky found himself at the Western perimeter of the forest encasing Akeja's land, wearing the closest thing to tactical gear he currently owned - his old jeans, white shirt and combat boots. He'd slunk out of the house as soon as the sun had begun to peek above the horizon, feeling as if his skin was stretched too tight over his bones. He'd had a dream - a flashback - that had startled him awake. He couldn't remember most of it, just strange, jilted moments - like a scream echoing in his ear, the heaviness of a gun in his hand, a shadow cowering, hiding. Whatever it was, it had jolted him from his sleep in such a way that he'd found himself gasping for air, swallowing words that he couldn't decipher. Perhaps an apology.

He'd thought that once Shuri had managed to sever the cords that Hydra had entwined him in, he'd be haunted less by the ghosts of his mind, but he'd accepted long before Wakanda that guilt was not something that could just be surgically removed. He would have to live with what he'd done, one day at a time. He was fine with that anyway. No one with as much blood on their hands as he did should ever be fully at peace. 

The forest had come alive with the rising sun. Birds were singing in the treetops above and critters were scurrying around the grass below, but Bucky blocked it all out. He was examining the forest floor for tracks that weren't made from animals, suspicious markings on trees, telltale signs of a campsite or fire. He'd been at it for an hour so far and had found nothing out of the ordinary, but that didn't mean that there wasn't anything out there. If he could become nothing but a shadow blending into the fauna, silent in his calculated movements, then so could anyone else.  _Paranoia keeps you alive_. Briefly, he wondered what Steve would've had to say on that thought. Probably something like  _"the whole world's not out to get you, Buck"._ Perhaps, but he no longer had to watch out for just himself. Now he was stuck with a spitfire of a Wakandan princess, and he wasn't about to let her kingly brother down and miss a hidden threat.

Three hours and a half in, Bucky crouched down and pressed a palm into the dirt. A satisfied smile tugged at his lips.

"Gotcha."

* * *

When Akeja went to pass through the living room so she could make breakfast, she paused at the beaded doorway. Bucky wasn't there. The sheets she'd given him had been folded into a neat pile and the couch had been put back together. Much to her disappointment, he'd left a note on the coffee table.

_Akeja,_

_You're probably thinking you finally got rid of me. You didn't._

_I'm surveying your perimeter for dangers but don't worry your pretty little head about it._

_Be back soon,_

_Bucky_

_P.S. had to rip this out of some book because you didn't have any paper lying around. Sorry._

Akeja flipped the note over and confirmed that he had indeed torn out the acknowledgement page of a Wakandan adventure novel she'd owned for a decade. Briefly, she considered the consequences of murdering a King's ward. Surely T'Challa would understand. In fact, if she buried his body on the property and came up with some excuse about how he'd ran blindly into the forest and never came back, he'd probably believe her. 

She continued to ponder this as she began frying a few eggs and strips of bacon. It was as she'd began to plate the food that Bucky came thundering in, covered in muck and grinning from ear to ear. 

"You're getting mud all over my floor!" she exclaimed, tempted to throw her spatula at his smug face. She'd had more near outbursts of violence in the past forty-eight hours of dealing with James Barnes than she'd had in the time since the Battle. 

"I think your brother's been spying on you," Bucky said, reaching over the counter for a piece of bacon and biting down on it.

Akeja paused, brows furrowing. "What do you mean?"

"He left tracks in the forest, to the South," he explained, much too happy with himself. "He's good but I'm better."

Akeja scoffed. "Of course you are. And how did you know these tracks in the _middle of the forest_ were his?"

"You think I didn't check him out when he was following me around Europe?" Bucky replied, tone almost offended. "I know what the ridges on the soles of his catsuit look like."

"I'm not surprised," Akeja admitted, sliding a plate heaped with breakfast food along to him. Bucky started stuffing his face as soon as his fingertips touched the porcelain. The Wakandan grimaced at the pieces of egg flying out of his mouth as he chewed ferociously.

She should've known that T'Challa minding his own business in the palace was too good to be true. He had always done stupid, selfish things with the excuse that it was for her own good. Hiding in the forest to check out what she was up to was more for his own benefit than for hers. He knew damn well that she needed space to find herself after everything that happened - if she returned to the palace, to her family, in the same state that she'd left it, she would destroy everything that she cared about. The Battle had left her weary, cold and  _tired_.

"Are you alright?"

Bucky's question caught her off guard. He'd been watching her closely, trying to catch her emotions as they flickered across her face with each thought. His eyes were gentle and earnest instead of bright and teasing and it made her shift uncomfortably on the spot. She didn't like how it made her feel to be looked at like that - like he genuinely cared how she felt. 

"I'm just thinking about my brother and how stupid he is," she answered, stabbing a fork into her own plate of eggs and bacon. It was as close to the truth as she wanted to get. 

Bucky finished his serving and rinsed the plate and used cutlery before turning to face her, hip leaning against the sink. "That painting you did... the battle. Were you there? Fighting?"

 

 

Akeja was glad that she was chewing slowly because she was sure that she would've choked on her food if hadn't been. The question had come out of seemingly nowhere, but the curiosity on Bucky's face was plain. He'd probably been wondering about it since he'd watched her finish the piece last night.

"Yes," Akeja replied after a moment of consideration. There wasn't any point in lying anyway; if he didn't find out from her, he'd most likely eventually would from T'Challa or Shuri. Probably Shuri most of all. She'd always had a big mouth. 

"Is that why you're out here now?"

Akeja didn't like where these questions were heading. "Maybe."

There was understanding in Bucky's eyes then, and Akeja liked that even less. 

"If you need to, you can talk to me about it," he offered. "I know what it's like. To want to isolate yourself after something like that."

 _No, you don't!_ Akeja wanted to scream in his face. Sure, he'd had to kill and maim and injure over the decades but it hadn't been entirely his fault. She'd seen the leaked Hydra files as they'd been blasted across worldwide news outlets. She knew about their control of his mind, his actions; knew that it was most likely Shuri who had helped him to become whole again. She did not have that excuse. She had killed and maimed and injured of her will.  _For Wakanda_. And she had lost everything because of it. 

"I'll let you think about it," Bucky said, sensing that he had unnerved her. "I have farmer work to do now. Like fixing that terrible fucking roof of yours. Where do you keep the tools at?"

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi guys!! thanks so much for the kudos, you're angels  
> hope you enjoyed this one! there's probably another one to come in the next 24 hours


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